Vital For Class X CBSE Board Exam

1. MADATSST
&
MUKUND INGLE
PRESENT

2. Mr. Mukund B. Ingle

3.  Its early history shows many different groups of people
living in this area under the shadow of the powerful
empire of China.
 Even when an independent country was established in
what is now northern and central Vietnam, its rulers
continued to maintain the Chinese system of
government as well as Chinese culture.
 Vietnam was also linked to what has been called the
maritime silk route that brought in goods, people and
ideas.
 Chinese stay in Vietnam for a longer period influenced
each and every aspect of her life such as language,
culture and education.

4.  The colonisation of Vietnam by the French brought the
people of the country into conflict with the colonisers in all
areas of life.
 French troops landed in Vietnam in 1858 and by the mid-
1880s they had established a firm grip over the northern
region.
 After the Franco-Chinese war the French assumed control of
Tonkin and Anaam and, in 1887, French Indo-China was
formed. In the following decades the French sought to
consolidate their position, and people in Vietnam began
reflecting on the nature of the loss that Vietnam was
suffering.

5.  Colonies were considered essential to supply natural resources
and other essential goods.
 Like other Western nations, France also thought it was the
mission of the ‘advanced’ European countries to bring the
benefits of civilization to backward peoples.
 The French began building canals and draining lands to convert
it into cultivation of rice. They built railways to transport the
goods from the corner of Vietnam to ports and ports to interior of
it.
 By the 1920s, to ensure higher levels of profit for their
businesses, French business interests were pressurizing the
government in Vietnam to develop the infrastructure further.

6.  Paul Bernard who was a writer and policy maker believed that
economy of the colony to be developed.
 If the economy was developed and the standard of living of the
people improved, they would buy more goods. The market would
consequently expand, leading to better profits for French
business.
 Bernard suggested that there were several barriers to economic
growth in Vietnam: high population levels, low agricultural
productivity and extensive indebtedness amongst the peasants.
 The colonial economy in Vietnam was, however, primarily based
on rice cultivation and rubber plantations owned by the French
and a small Vietnamese elite.

7.  Civilizing Mission
 French colonization was not based only on economic
exploitation. It was also driven by the idea of a ‘civilizing
mission’. Like the British in India, the French claimed that they
were bringing modern civilization to the Vietnamese.
 They took for granted that Europe had developed the most
advanced civilisation. So it became the duty of the Europeans
to introduce these modern ideas to the colony even if this
meant destroying local cultures, religions and traditions,
because these were seen as outdated and prevented modern
development.
 Education was seen as one way to civilise the ‘native’.

8.  Dilemma of Medium of Instruction
 There were two broad opinions on this question. Some policymakers
emphasised the need to use the French language as the medium of
instruction. By learning the language, they felt, the Vietnamese would be
introduced to the culture and civilisation of France.
 This would help create an ‘Asiatic France solidly tied to European
France’. The educated people in Vietnam would respect French
sentiments and ideals, see the superiority of French culture, and work
for the French.
 Others were opposed to French being the only medium of instruction.
They suggested that Vietnamese be taught in lower classes and French
in the higher classes. They believed that it would help them to remove
the Chinese influence.

9.  School textbooks glorified the French and justified colonial rule.
The Vietnamese were represented as primitive and backward,
capable of manual labour but not of intellectual reflection; they
could work in the fields but not rule themselves; they were ‘skilled
copyists’ but not creative.
 A deliberate policy of failing students, particularly in the final year,
so that they could not qualify for the better-paid jobs. Usually, as
many as two-thirds of the students failed. In 1925, in a population
of 17 million, there were less than 400 who passed the
examination.
 As the numbers of Vietnamese teachers increased in the lower
classes, it became difficult to control what was actually taught.
While teaching, Vietnamese teachers quietly modified the text
and criticized what was stated.

10.  The school’s approach to what it means to be ‘modern’ is a good
example of the thinking prevalent at that time. It was not
enough to learn science andWestern ideas: to be modern the
Vietnamese had to also look modern.
 TheTonkin Free School encouraged the adoption ofWestern
styles such as having a short haircut. For theVietnamese this
meant a major break with their own identity since they
traditionally kept long hair.
 As the numbers ofVietnamese teachers increased in the lower
classes, it became difficult to control what was actually taught.
While teaching,Vietnamese teachers quietly modified the text
and criticized what was stated.


11.  In 1926 a major protest erupted in the Saigon Native Girls School. A
Vietnamese girl sitting in one of the front seats was asked to move to the
back of the class and allow a local French student to occupy the front
bench. She refused and expelled from the school, leading to a further
spread of open protests. Seeing the situation getting out of control, the
government forced the school to take the students back.
 Elsewhere, students fought against the colonial government’s efforts to
prevent the Vietnamese from qualifying for white-collar jobs. By the
1920s, students were forming various political parties, such as the Party
of Young Annan, and publishing nationalist journals such as the
Annanese Student.
 Schools thus became an important place for political and cultural battles.
The battle against French colonial education became part of the larger
battle against colonialism and for independence.

12.  Plague Strikes Hanoi
 The latest ideas about architecture and modern engineering skills
were employed to build a new and ‘modern’ city. When rebuilding
was going, Hanoi was struck with Plague.
 The French part of Hanoi was built as a beautiful and clean city
with wide avenues and a well-laid-out sewer system, while the
‘native quarter’ was not provided with any modern facilities. The
refuse from the old city drained straight out into the river or,
during heavy rains or floods, overflowed into the streets.
 The sewers also served as a great transport system, allowing the
rats to move around the city without any problem. And rats began
to enter the well-cared-for homes of the French through the
sewage pipes.

13.  The Rat Hunt
 To stem this invasion, a rat hunt was started in 1902. The French hired
Vietnamese workers and paid them for each rat they caught.
 For the Vietnamese the rat hunt seemed to provide an early lesson in the
success of collective bargaining. Those who did the dirty work of entering sewers
found that if they came together they could negotiate a higher bounty.
 They also discovered innovative ways to profit from this situation. The bounty was
paid when a tail was given as proof that a rat had been killed. So the rat-catchers
took to just clipping the tails and releasing the rats, so that the process could be
repeated, over and over again. Some people, in fact, began raising rats to earn a
bounty.
 In a way, the rat menace marks the limits of French power and the contradictions
in their ‘civilising mission’. And the actions of the rat-catchers tell us of the
numerous small ways in which colonialism was fought in everyday life.

14.  Colonial domination was exercised by control over all areas of
private and public life. The French occupied Vietnam militarily but
they also sought to reshape social and cultural life. While religion
played an important role in strengthening colonial control, it also
provided ways of resistance.
 From the eighteenth century, many religious movements were
hostile to the Western presence. An early movement against French
control and the spread of Christianity was the Scholars Revolt in
1868.
 This revolt was led by officials at the imperial court angered by the
spread of Catholicism and French power. They led a general
uprising in Ngu An and Ha Tien provinces where over a thousand
Catholics were killed.
 The French crushed the movement but this uprising served to
inspire other patriots to rise up against them.

15.  Religious Distribution of Population
 The elites inVietnam were educated in Chinese and
Confucianism. But religious beliefs among the peasantry
were shaped by a variety of syncretic traditions that
combined Buddhism and local beliefs.
 There were many popular religions inVietnam that were
spread by people who claimed to have seen a vision of
God.
 Some of these religious movements supported the French,
but others inspired movements against colonial rule.

16.  Some of these religious movements supported the French, but others
inspired movements against colonial rule.
 One such movement was the Hoa Hao. It began in 1939 and gained great
popularity in the fertile Mekong delta area. It drew on religious ideas
popular in anti-French uprisings of the nineteenth century.
 The founder of Hoa Hao was a man called Huynh Phu So. He performed
miracles and helped the poor. His criticism against useless expenditure had
a wide appeal. He also opposed the sale of child brides, gambling and the
use of alcohol and opium.
 The French tried to suppress the movement inspired by Huynh Phu So.
They declared him mad, called him the Mad Bonze, and put him in a
mental asylum. Interestingly, the doctor who had to prove him insane
became his follower, and finally in 1941, even the French doctors declared
that he was sane. The French authorities exiled him to Laos and sent many
of his followers to concentration camps.

17.  Phan Boi Chau
 Educated in the Confucian tradition, Phan Boi Chau (1867-1940) was
one such nationalist. He became a major figure in the anti-colonial
resistance from the time he formed the Revolutionary Society (Duy Tan
Hoi) in 1903, with Prince Cuong De as the head.
 Phan Boi Chau met the Chinese reformer Liang Qichao (1873-1929) in
Yokohama in 1905. Phan’s most influential book, The History of the Loss
of Vietnam was written under the strong influence and advice of Qichao.
 The book focuses on two connected themes: the loss of sovereignty and
the severing of ties with China – ties that bound the elites of the two
countries within a shared culture. It is this double loss that Phan
laments, a lament that was typical of reformers from within the traditional
elite.

18.  Phan Chu Trinh
 He was intensely hostile to the monarchy and opposed to
the idea of resisting the French with the help of the court.
His desire was to establish a democratic republic.
 Profoundly influenced by the democratic ideals of the West,
he did not want a wholesale rejection of Western
civilisation. He accepted the French revolutionary ideal of
liberty but charged the French for not abiding by the ideal.
 He demanded that the French set up legal and educational
institutions, and develop agriculture and industries.

19.  Go East Movement
 In 1907-08 some 300 Vietnamese students went to Japan to acquire modern education. For
many of them the primary objective was to drive out the French from Vietnam, overthrow the
puppet emperor and re-establish the Nguyen dynasty that had been deposed by the French.
 Vietnamese students established a branch of the Restoration Society in Tokyo but after 1908,
the Japanese Ministry of Interior clamped down on them. Many, including Phan Boi Chau,
were deported and forced to seek exile in China and Thailand.
 Developments in China also inspired Vietnamese nationalists. In 1911, the long established
monarchy in China was overthrown by a popular movement under Sun Yat-sen, and a
Republic was set up.
 Inspired by these developments, Vietnamese students organised the Association for the
Restoration of Vietnam (Viet-Nam Quan Phuc Hoi). Now the nature of the anti-French
independence movement changed. The objective was no longer to set up a constitutional
monarchy but a democratic republic.
 These nationalists looked for the foreign help and arms against French. They appealed Japan
and China to help them as fellow Asians.

20. THANK YOU